Changing Spots
by PutMoneyInThyPurse
Summary: Two-shot. Preparation and aftermath for a behind-the-Curtain assignment gone awry. Shameless get-Kelly. Slash in Part 2.
1. Before

AN: Collection of many neglected fics in my sentbox. Trying to get all out of the way so I can quit with relatively few regrets.

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**Changing Spots**

"So this is goodbye, Gertrude."

"Don't say goodbye." Scotty tries to match Kelly's light tone. "Say _au rev—"_

His voice catches. He stares at his partner's windblown blond hair, knowing Kel has a supply of the bottle it came out of. Hair tends to grow in six months. And it wouldn't do for anyone to find out Kel's not really a blond. Not where he's going.

_"Au revoir, _then, D'Artagnan." Kel smiles gamely at him, blue eyes shining.

Scotty can't get over how unnatural those baby-blues look, although he concedes that the new technology is something else. He tries to match his partner's grin. _"Sayonara."_

Kelly rises to the challenge. _"Auf Wiedersehen."_

_"Ciao," _Scotty says easily.

_"Ila el-liqaa."_

_Oh, getting out the big guns, are ya? "Ba'adye."_

Kelly matches his gaze. _"Puang toi."_

Oh, that's right, Kelly knows Vietnamese. _"Tsedesutyun."_

Kelly smiles at Scotty's choice. _"Adios."_

The Spanish suddenly breaks Scotty's heart. "This is where we came in. Don't say _adios, _man, say…"

"Hey, Robinson! Transport's waiting!"

Kelly's smile widens unnaturally. He reaches out for a handshake. Scotty clasps the white hand tightly in both of his, and Kelly places his other hand over their joined ones. Before Scotty can think what to say, he's pulled away, jogging towards the hangar with that fluid grace he has. The door opens and closes, and Kelly's gone.

"Don't forget to write," Scotty says flatly, words borne on the steel breeze.

His eyes rake the corrugated iron, as though he could see through it to Kelly. Kelly, whose appearance is so changed by technology. For the first time in his entire life, Scotty wishes he were white. Wishes the technology existed to _make _him white, just for a year.

Because if he were, he could follow Kelly where he's going.


	2. After

AN: Collection of many neglected fics in my sentbox. Trying to get all out of the way so I can quit with relatively few regrets.

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**Chapter 2: After**

There's a strange sensation of vertigo as Scotty stands upon the snow-covered footbridge, his breath forming little frozen clouds of crystal in the air. The powerline hums beside him, the sinister vibration coiling like a rattlesnake.

A car pulls up at the other end, tires scrunching in the snow. Dirty tracks in the pristine white powder. Dirty metal against the slate-grey sky.

The back door opens, a tattered figure tumbling out into the snow. Scotty surges forward and it's all the border guards can do to hold him back. It makes no sense, how can the snow under his feet be Germany and the snow ten feet away be Mother Russia, or—Iron Curtain, that's a laugh, it's not even a trench—and why isn't that motionless lump in the snow moving, is it even _him,_ did they trick him or—But he knows it's him, the brown hair growing out under the blond dye, pointless to keep touching up the roots now his cover's blown—"Kelly!"

There's no motion at all, no change in the huddled pose. Scotty puts his back into it, shoves the burly guards hard with his shoulders, but they're immovable, like granite. "Lemme—" he grunts. "Is he—KELLY!"

They don't tell him to stay back, they don't say a word, they just leave him to push and shove and scream uselessly into the chill air. He's finally reduced to just shouting Kelly's name, over and over, eyes never leaving the dark shape in the snow; he's sobbing now, not knowing if he's alive or—

The hand moves, feebly.

"Attaboy, Kel!" Scotty yells. "C'mon, Champ! You can do it!"

The shapeless bundle unfurls, resolves into a bowed back balanced precariously on tottering elbows and knees. Stick-figure, dear Lord, arms bony bird-limbs beneath a tattered, filthy shirt. Shaking, of course he was shaking, it was freezing, Scotty was in his thermal underwear and three sweaters and heavy winter coat and _he_ was chilled, and Kelly's bare skin, half-exposed to the snow, bruises showing through the rips and tears in the fabric…

His head doesn't rise. Scotty keeps yelling, _what_ he doesn't quite know, and the figure shuffles forward on hands and knees. One step, two, and then Scotty flinches as he falls face-down in the snow. "No layin' down on the job, now!" he calls. "C'mon, we got places to go and things to do, man!"

He's stepped halfway around the burly guards so as to get a better look at his partner, but now he pushes back against them. "For cryin' out loud, just let me—I'm not gonna invade your precious country, I just wanna—can't you see he can't—KELLY!"

Another torturous, shaky few inches of forward motion, and the broken body falls forward again. Scotty's face is covered with ice crystals. "Kelly. Kel. C'mon, Duke, please. Please, please, man, pretty please with… with a big red berry on top. And ice-cream. A la mode." His voice has dropped to a choked whisper. Kelly's stick-fingers are blue, his bony feet bare and bleeding against the dirty white of the snow, the shirt pulling back, exposing a torso covered with bruises, yellow and blue and purple and green, bruises on top of bruises. "I'll give you a brand-new train-set. And take you to the circus, you'd like that, wouldn't ya, huh? And a new football…"

His pained murmur falters, and he swallows hard. There's barely three feet between him and Kelly now. His partner hasn't looked up once, but it doesn't matter, there'll be time for that, time for anything and everything in the world if Kelly'll just hold on a little bit longer, hold it together just another minute, just three feet more, Kel, just a little bit more, now, pal, c'mon, champ, c'mon, man, I'm rootin' for ya here, you got yourself your own lil' ol' cheering section, up close and personal, just for you, c'mon, Kel, I've missed ya so much, you're not gonna give up three feet from the finish line, are ya?

The ice crystals are thick on Scotty's face, cracking and breaking off as he shoves desperately against the guards, and Kelly's just out of arm's reach when his abused arms give way, and he falls.

"No!" Scotty manages to get his arm out, reaching frantically between the two guards, but Kelly's down for the count, just out of reach. It's a miracle how he got this far, anyway, and Scotty doesn't resent him, not for an instant, but this cannot be happening, he can't have come this far to lose Kelly now. It's agony to look at him and scream his name, knowing he can't hear him, knowing he's slowly dying of cold before his eyes. He's aching to get to him, straining to get to him. He can't watch Kelly die, he can't, he…"For God's sake, man!" he shouts into the closest guard's face. "Just a lousy inch!"

The guard half-turns. Scotty can't see that he's reached behind him, until he closes one beefy hand around the stick-like arm, and drags Kelly's limp body a few inches forward.

In the split-second between seeing and believing, Scotty's eyes snap up to the guard's. For a fraction of a second there's something in the cold blue eyes, then it's gone.

"Thank you," he breathes, but he's already on his knees, shouldering out of his coat. "Gotcha now, Kel. I gotcha, everything's gonna be all right." He's murmuring meaninglessly, on and on, as he enfolds Kelly with the bulky garment, still warm from his own body. He doesn't bother with armholes or sleeves, just bundles him into it, lifting him and carrying the light, fragile body to the car.

Walter, the Embassy envoy, is waiting at the wheel. The interior of the Buick is a sauna, Walt's got the heat cranked up – Scotty always did like that cat – and he slides into the back seat, still cradling Kelly close. "Home, James," he says even as the vehicle jerks into motion, wheels spinning slightly against the snow that's piled up in the minutes he's been outside.

He hasn't dared—so far—there hasn't been any vapor that he can see from Kelly's breath, and—His own heart seems to pause in its beating as he places two fingers on the carotid artery. Thank God, there's a pulse, beating beneath his fingers. Life. Hope.

"No more away missions, huh?" He can see Kelly's face now, look his fill at the gaunt and bony features. Kel's always had what the magazines call a sculpted chin, but now his whole damn face is sculpted, cheeks sunken, eyes prominent in hollow, dark sockets. He dares to nudge the coat open and fumble with the shirt-buttons, opening them to reveal a torso that's skeletal, ribs jutting out, skin sallow and loose. _Oh, Kelly. _It shouldn't be a surprise; food is scarce in the Soviet Union anyway, so why should he assume they'd feed their prisoners any better than their citizens? But still, seeing his partner like this…

"Never again, man," Scotty murmurs, running a hand softly over Kelly's scrawny chest, letting the palm of his hand rest on Kel's solar plexus, feeling the warmth leach from his own hand into the chill body. "Never again." Struck with a brainwave, he hikes up his sweater to bare his own chest, then pulls Kelly up to face him, pressing their bare torsos together. Kelly sighs a little, involuntarily; his chilled skin feels like Scotty's holding a block of ice, so it's a fair guess that Kel feels like he's sitting by the fireplace right now. He wraps his arms round the emaciated, brutalized body. Nothing so fragile, nothing so strong, nothing so treasured, nothing at all. "Never let you…" He trails off as Kelly's face turns towards his, the cold cheek touching his own.

With an involuntary sound, Scotty turns his face towards Kelly's, kissing the sunken hollow beneath the cheekbone, pressing tender kisses to the closed eyes deep in their hollow sockets, overwhelmed by an emotion he can't name, can't place, an emotion that rocks him to his core, destroys him, remakes him, makes him whole. Again and again he kisses the cold face, and it's only weeks later that he remembers that Walter was even in the car.

The cheek beneath his lips shifts, and he jerks his head back, hardly daring to hope. "'m no… Sleepin' Beauty," grates Kelly's hoarse whisper, his crooked grin the most beautiful thing Scotty's ever seen in his entire life.

"That's what you think," Scotty murmurs, kissing his brow. It feels good, so he does it again, and again.

"N—ope," Kelly slurs, still affected by hypothermia. "'M… Prince… Charming."

"Oh," Scotty bends to touch his lips to Kelly's – they're cold, so he lingers, pressing softly to warm them up – "I see. If you, sir, are Prince Charming, then, what does that make me, pray tell?"

Kelly turns and snuggles deeper into Scotty's body, and Scotty obliges by hitching him up, pulling him closer and kissing his hair. "Wicked Witch of the West?"

Scotty snorts. "Says the guy who's growin' out a dye job so bad they should _die_ it."

"That's an… atrocious pun, man." A chill grips Kelly, and he shudders as Scotty holds him tight.

"Okay, okay. Pipe down. We can engage in a battle of wits later." He strokes Kelly's hair and gives him another kiss, just to make his point.

"…hate to figh'… an unarmed… opponent…" comes the sigh as Kelly settles into sleep.

"You just keep believing that, Hoby," Scotty smiles down at Kelly. "You just keep believing it."

* * *

It's much, much later, in hospital, that they get a card that says simply, "Congratulations," signed "Walter." He never says anything beyond that, but when they're in his neck of the woods, he always books them the bridal suite, and gives them a conspiratorial smile. Scotty supposes he should mind, but somehow, he doesn't, and neither does Kelly. Not that he can tell, anyway.


End file.
